As television receivers, media players and other media playback devices become increasingly sophisticated, additional functions and features have been enabled. Modern television receivers, for example, are now capable of providing additional data to accompany television broadcast content, or of taking any number of useful actions to enhance the viewer's enjoyment of their television programming.
While it would be desirable to allow the television receiver to take enhanced actions based upon the content of the advertisements or other portions of the live broadcast, this can be very difficult to implement in practice. In particular, it can be very difficult for a cable, direct broadcast satellite (DBS) or other content distributor to know in advance when certain commercials will be run. Conventional electronic program guides, for example, typically provide information about programming schedules, channel lineups and the like, but do not typically include detailed information about the specific content components of the broadcast, particularly the timing and identities of commercials that may be present in the broadcast stream. Moreover, due to the nature of live broadcasting, it is not always possible to know in advance where the ads will be located, or what ads will be run. During a live broadcast of a sporting event, for example, it is very difficult to predict when the commercial breaks will occur, or even how many advertisements will run during the course of the program. Further, local affiliates often modify network schedules to provide different advertising in local markets. Without accurate identification of the content, it can be a substantial challenge for the content distributor to offer enhanced actions based upon the particular content of the stream.
It is therefore desirable to create systems, device and methods to reliably and quickly allow a content distributor to identify the specific contents of a particular television broadcast, such as the timing and content of advertisements. These and other desirable features and characteristics will become apparent from the subsequent detailed description and the appended claims, taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings and this background section.